However, according to North Dakota State Climatologist Daryl Ritchison, numbers recorded at official airport weather stations don’t always reflect the broader climate reality on the ground. “You have to remember the airport temperature is surrounded by pavement, there’s rocks underneath the temperature sensor so that they don’t have to trim it so much,” Ritchison explained. Site Discrepancies: Pavement, gravel, and concrete surrounding runways absorb and radiate heat far more intensely than open fields or grass. Historical Data and the Urban Heat ShiftWhile modern airport readings occasionally top century-old benchmarks—such as Bismarck’s previous record set in 1929—Ritchison cautioned against direct “apples-to-apples” comparisons across different decades. Historically, North Dakota’s weather records were kept by volunteer cooperative observers who maintained daily logs in rural environments for decades.